Friday 7 December 2012

Adventure Review: The Awards


Journey’s End
We have now safely returned from the hard road of travelling to my parents’ home in Beragh, Co Tyrone. Things are unsurprisingly unchanged apart from the cold that hit us like a brick wall when we got out of the airport. But the warmth of Southern California beckons and we fly out on Tuesday (11th Dec) morning.

As a way of a review my wife and I have put together some of our most, and least favourite aspect of our travels. To spice it up a bit we picked a number of categories and then wrote them independently.  
BEST CUISINE
Mrs Says: My award goes to Thailand (I can picture my husband rolling his eyes as he reads this since I know he will be raving on about Malaysian faire and how nothing else can possibly compare). Malaysian food was very good, but the Thai food we ate was absolutely delicious. I love all the coconut milk, lemon grass, galangal and cilantro/coriander they use in their cooking. Some of my favourite Thai dishes were Tom Yum Gai (Thai Chicken Soup) and Massaman curry . . .mmmmm my mouth is now salivating!
Verdict: Thailand
Mr Says: No contest here. The three main ethnic groups in Malaysia, Chinese, Malay and Indian seem to be in constant competition to try and prove their superiority, this doesn’t always end up being a positive, but when it comes to food the diversity combines to become the world’s best street food. My wife is no doubt going to say Thailand in this category, but for me while their food was good, it tended to be either too spicy or too sweet.
Verdict: Malaysia

WORST CUISINE
Mrs Says: I have decided to give this award to Cambodia. Although the only food I ate that made me physically sick was from India and Laos, Cambodia gets the Worst Cuisine Award as they eat cockroaches by choice….Insane in the Membrane! Even looking past all the insects, their stir fries and fried rice were boring and always left you feeling unsatisfied and craving a snickers.
Verdict: Cambodia
Mr Says: Indian food was no doubt the biggest let down when it came to food. In fairness meat was pretty much out of bounds due to hygiene as were hawker stands but this still didn’t stop us getting sick. Most of the food was veggie slop with rice and an uninspiring bread, that bore no resemblance to Indian food we get in the West. With that said though Cambodian food was disgusting, Red Ant sauce, frogs, fried (or raw) insects, rice porridge, take your pick Cambodia had a whole host of food to help you lose weight by being uneatable. It wasn’t all complete doom and gloom though as could always pick up a baguette and Siem Reap had some of the best Western food of our trip but neither saved Cambodia from ending up bottom of the pile.
Verdict: Cambodia
BEST SIGHT
Mrs Says: The Taj Mahal or the Temples of Angkor, Taj Mahal or Angkor hmmmm it’s a tough one. They were both incredible, but since the Taj is in India I will give the award to Angkor ;)
Verdict: Temples of Angkor
Mr Says: I won’t start going on describing the Taj again as I already got a bit carried away in my Agra post, but in my defence I reckon it is all justified. Other places worth a mention were the rocks of Hampi and the Elora and Ajanta Caves, and Angkor Wat. Although none came close to the marvel left by the Mogul Empire
Verdict: Taj Mahal
MOST HUMBLING EXPERIENCE
Mrs Says: While waiting in Mughal Sari train station, outside Varanasi, I was sitting on a bench and begun watching a family in front of me that clearly lived at this horribly dirty and disgusting rat filled train station. At first I saw the son, who was around 4 years of age, sitting on his own and only wearing a small pair of shorts, think Mogli. A middle class Indian that was sitting next to me saw me watching him and must of noted a concerned look on my face as he leaned over and said to me “Don’t worry about him, he is a bad person.” The boy was soon joined by his mother, who was about my age and completely deaf and his younger sister who was about 1 ½ and wasn’t wearing a scrap of clothes. The mother and sister had just come from the toilets, where she had just given herself and the girl a bath as well as washing the children’s clothes, hence their lack of clothing. She begin miming to her son to go hang the clothes out to dry on the railings upstairs and it was clear formal sign language was something they will never know.  After the son came back, he began to run around with his sister and shortly returned to get his mother’s attention. He was alerting his mother that his sister had just peed all over the floor leaving a very large puddle considering the size of the child. The mother ran over and took her daughter by the arm back to the toilet to give her a wash and then collected scraps of newspapers lying about on the floor to use to clean up the young girl’s mess. Now I guess this doesn’t seem at all significant to you reading this, but the amount of people in India we saw urinating and defecating in public was immense. There is pee and poo everywhere and mother could have just easily let the puddle sit there. I found the situation incredibly humbling as the mother was homeless with two children to look after with no ability to hear or speak to them and still showed incredible dignity by cleaning up her family’s mess in this horrifically filthy station.
Verdict: Dignity of Deaf Homeless Mother
Mr Says: There is no doubt that Indian poverty is horrendous, but I was fairly ruthless in my opinion of it and switched off from it as best I could, but the first (of many!) sight of public defecation in India was a shocking sight. Having a private place to poo is something that we take for granted in the West and the sight of a fully grown man doing his business in full public view I thought was appalling. Apart from the obvious reaction of disgust it also appeared that that the man had reached rock bottom in terms of dignity. The Indian perspective is undoubtedly different and it was probably all just part of his daily routine, but it left me with a lot to think about.
Verdict: First Indian Defecation
MOST DESIRABLE PLACE TO IMMIGRATE
Mrs Says: As we travelled through India and SE Asia, I often thought about how lucky I was to grow up and live in the “West,” where we all expect and take for granted a certain standard of infrastructure, food hygiene and non-corrupt government. There are many people in the world that do not enjoy such luxuries including the citizens of India, Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam. If I had to immigrate to one country we visited, it would be Malaysia. Malaysia was the wealthiest country were we in and as a result has excellent food hygiene, great roads, toilet paper in the WCs and I would be able to live a comfortable life similar to the standard I am accustomed to in America and Ireland.
Verdict: Malaysia
Mr Says: Although many of the countries we visited had great sights and were fantastic to visit, living in them would be a different kettle of fish and for this category I was definitely gravitating to the most developed countries. So it comes as no surprise that the most developed country, Malaysia is the forerunner here. Life would just be easier here, English is widely spoken, the infrastructure is exceptional, there is a high standard of living and has lots of super cheap and delicious food. So, despite the ethnic tensions, restrictions on non-Islamic religions and expensive beer Malaysia eases to No.1 spot in this category. 
Verdict: Malaysia

LEAST DESIRABLE PLACE TO IMMIGRATE
Mrs Says: India, no explanation required.
Verdict: India
Mr Says: India immediately jumps to mind for this category, but if I was forced to it I am fairly confident that I could live and work there. English is by and large understood and people at least appear to have an urgency (which is usually misplaced) about them. However the lack of beef on the menu, the corruption, the lack of logic and the general craziness of it all would make life far more difficult and frustrating than it needs to be. The lazy, go slow attitude of Laos and lack of English would also make it a contender but India as it so often does overwhelms all other opposition here.
Verdict: India
MOST EMBARRASSING MOMENT
Mrs Says: While in Langkawi, Malaysia my husband and I decided to rent a scooter to tour around the island on. I had never driven one before and since my husband is good at anything he touches, we thought it best my husband drove and we agreed that once we got out of town he would give me a lesson. We travelled up north on the island to a beautiful waterfall and my husband began to give me a scooter lesson in the car park. The parking lot had “minders,” not dissimilar to the men you pay to ensure they don’t steal your car when you park near Drumcrondra Road for a football match. So of course my lesson was taking place under their watchful eyes. I was doing alright at first and drove around in a few circles until I decided to drive on the periphery of the car park and ended up at the bottom of a small downward slope. I was having trouble getting back up the slope and throttled a little too hard before taking off the brakes a little too fast and was about two seconds away from crashing into a parked car before regaining control of the scooter. Now at that point, I figured I better give the scooter back to my husband and thought we should go back to our accommodation when one of the minders begins to shout at my husband, “If you want to train your wife, you need to go somewhere else! If she crashes you are going to have to pay!” Of course my reaction to him was a very mature, “yeah, yeah, we were leaving anyways!”
Verdict: Langkawi Scooter Lesson
Mr Says: We had hired an Auto Rickshaw to take us around the Elora caves in India and the driver was extremely courteous and friendly, most unlike usual auto drivers. However, while visiting some of the caves we were, as usual, getting the relentless bombardment for attention from Indian tourists and street vendors alike. Frustrated, I had tried to wander away from the hordes and decided that the next person to cross our paths would receive the sharp end of my tongue. Unfortunately, the direction I was wandering was out of bounds and unfortunately for our own Auto driver he tried to direct me in the correct direction. I didn’t recognise him as our own hired driver and mistook him for one of the regular harassers and give him a very blunt expletive. My ever reliant wife quickly corrected my mistake “That is our driver!” and the innocent driver could see the funny side of it. It didn’t help my embarrassment however and my wife had a great time laughing at me over the next few days! I also made just as big of a fool of myself with my exchange with a Malaysian bus driver, but he was a rude chap and I was a lot more embarrassed about telling our mild mannered Auto driver to (ahem!) “go away”
Verdict: Elora Caves Auto Driver
FRIENDLIEST COUNTRY
Mrs Says: Cambodia, hands down. Of the Cambodians that could speak English, they were all so chatty and enjoyed joking around with us. Of the ones that couldn’t speak English, they were still very polite and always smiling at us or offering us some of their food, even if that food was cockroaches.
Verdict: Cambodia
Mr Says: On face value this should be India as people are always rushing up to you to talk to you however they always have an alternative motive:  getting your Money! The most genuinely friendly people were probably the Cambodians, but the people of Laos are probably on an equal footing here. Also I should point out that the efficient and fun loving Vietnamese were my favourite people, but they were a little too pushy and blunt to be considered friendly as such. Nevertheless the Khmers of Cambodia win this one, based on the fact that many of them have just lived through the genocide of the Killing Fields and they seem to smile relentlessly!
Verdict: Cambodia
BEST JOURNEY
Mrs Says: We had missed the daily ferry to Koh Mook in the Trang Islands off the west coast of Thailand so we had to charter a longtail boat to get there.  This journey was about an hour through incredible clear turquoise waters with beautiful views of karst islands and since it was only the two of us and the boatman, I felt like I was on my honeymoon again.
Verdict: Koh Mook Long Tail   
Mr Says: Good and easy journeys were few and far between but the overnight train from Trang in Southern Thailand to Bangkok was a revelation. No rats or faeces in the station and on board the train mice and cockroaches were also missing. The beds were made up by the staff and provided a reasonably comfortable sleep despite the train being a little juddery. There was even a proper dining car that served beer! The most disappointing aspect was that most of the journey was at night and we didn’t get to enjoy the trip for a little longer.
Verdict: Trang to Bangkok Train
WORST JOURNEY
Mrs Says: Ugh, there were far too many terrible journeys on this trip! Most have already been pushed back to the recesses of my mind never to be remembered again along with all the other horrors of my past (Boyz to Men, scrunchies, my bangs/fringe….shudder). So I am not surprised that the only ones I can remember very well were in the last part of our trip, getting to and around Vietnam. I have ruled it down two journeys with Runner Up going to our bus journey from Hanoi to Hue, which our Lonely Planet stated should be 12 hours. Damn you Lonely Planet and your underestimations! The bus departed Hanoi at 8am and didn’t arrive in Hue until 1:30am; seventeen and a half hours later! This left me so incredibly frustrated and with no choice, but to do what any self-respecting woman would do in the situation: take it out on her husband. The winner though has to go our journey from Luang Prabang to Dien Bien Phu. We anticipated that this journey would take two days and were not surprised when we had to stay the night in this dump of a place, Muagh Khua. I ate something dodgy in Laos and woke up vomiting, which continued on for the next two days. My husband reasoned with me that it would be better to keep going then to stay another night in Muagh Khua, so I got dressed and gave it a go. After waiting for over 5 hours for the bus to even turn up, we got on only to find it was already full of cargo including live chickens and boxes and boxes of red bull. It took 8 hours to go 67 miles over sorry excuse for roads through the mountains all the while I had to hold my head out the window and rest my feet on red bull.
Verdict: Luang Prabang to Dien Bien Phu buses
Mr Says: Although the chicken bus from Laos to Vietnam was awful, the bus from Hampi to Mysore was a bedbug nightmare come true for me. My seat seemed to be the only one infested and the bedbugs happily munched on me all night long. It was absolutely horrendous and I suffered from the swelling and itching from their hundreds of bites for days following, so even though the bus was relatively comfortable and the road good, but the dreaded black mites made this trip for me easily the worst.
Verdict: Hampi to Mysore Bus
FAVOURITE PERSON WE MET ON OUR TRAVELS
Mrs Says: This is a difficult one as we met so many other people travelling around with such interesting stories. From the Australian that drove a motor cycle up the length of Vietnam, to the artist from Curacao permanently travelling and funding it by selling her art online or the Canadian who just finished working In the Philippines for an NGO helping to develop East Timor, it is hard to pick just one. It is funny though my favourite person wasn’t another traveller, but a local hotel owner in Koh Mook Thailand. I regret that we never even got his name, but he was one of the kindest, gentlest people I have ever met. He had lived out in LA and New Orleans working for motorcycle shops for a few years before returning to Thailand to work as a shrimp farmer before eventually opening up the CocoLodge with his sister. He had this beautiful waist length hair and was all “one with nature,” but in a genuine and sincere way. He took my husband and I out snorkelling and to the Emerald cave and we couldn’t help just enjoy being in his presence.
Verdict: Koh Mook Coco Lodge Owner
Mr says: Difficult one this, the owner of Coco Lodge on Koh Mok was a legend, but I think that this award goes to our young German friend Robert.  Robert went for all the cheapest things possible, lowest train class, worst hotels and India still didn’t take a flinch out of him. We met him at filthy Mugal Sari train station in Varanasi and while I walked around grimacing at the rats and faeces, Robert told us how much he was enjoying his travels in India. Despite his low budget, Robert always seemed to have money for another beer and after he had his fill in the pub in Darjeeling he would race back up the hill to try and meet his 10pm curfew, which he usually failed! I hope those exams went ok Robert, if you are still reading!
Verdict: Robert the German
OVERALL WINNER Best Country
Mrs Says: I hate to sit on the fence on this one, but it is impossible to choose. My favourite place we went was definitely Koh Mook in Thailand as it is paradise on Earth, but I could not say that about some of the places we were in in the interior of Thailand. Likewise, India was so challenging to travel through, but was very rewarding as we fortunate enough to be able to see sights like Taj Mahal, Ajanta Caves, the Jodhpur fort and tour the backwaters of Kerala. I guess if I was forced to give an answer, the best country award should go to the one country I would really like to go back to if I had the chance, which would be Thailand.  There are so many other islands along the west and east coasts that I would really like to explore and relax on their beaches.   
Verdict: Thailand
Mr Says: The countries of South East Asia were a lot easier to travel in than India, however India rewarded the difficulties and frustration of travelling with her amazing sights. No country I think could have such varied and inspiring sights as the Forts and Palaces of Rajasthan, the Taj Mahal or weird and relaxed Hampi and the carved caves of the Deccan Plateaux. And of course let’s not forget you can kick back on the beaches of Goa or Varkala. So in spite of everything bad about India there was a whole lot of good and all of it (good & bad) was a mind-blowing experience.
Verdict: India
So there you have it folks, that is the end of our travel blog. I would like to thank you all for spending your time reading the blog. I have to say that although it was sometimes stressful and a burden, I have enjoyed writing it so I hope that you enjoyed reading it. I wouldn’t mind doing a weekly blog on something else, but I am not sure on the subject area, I have had a few ideas: “Weekly Beer Blog”, “An Immigrants Tale”, “LA News review from the Dude”. I will let you know about if and when I get it going. But this is the end of MandMs Asian Adventure so, Goodbye and Happy (Merry?) Christmas.

Wednesday 28 November 2012

Hanoi & Ha-Long Bay

Days 94-97


I am writing this post from the departures hall of Suvarnabhumi International Airport in Bangkok, Thailand and it is safe to say that our trip is now well and truly over as we are on a stopover on our way home. We spent the last few days in Hanoi, were we couldn’t eke out enough time to do it justice and cruising among the limestone cliffs of Ha-Long Bay, which was great but the weather was awful.
We arrived in the Vietnamese capital Hanoi on a flight from Da Nang on Sunday (25th) afternoon. My perception of Hanoi is of roads filled with scooters and motorbikes, the stories we were hearing from other tourists fed into that picture and our drive from the airport definitely succeeded in fulfilling my perception. The scooters were everywhere, weaving in and out of traffic and crossing junctions in an endless stream seemingly ignorant to any rules. Although it was quickly apparent that the most important rule of the road is that size matters in Vietnam and they made plenty of room for our taxi. Pedestrians don’t enjoy the same privilege to cars as we were to find out on our walk around the centre of the city. Crossing a busy road involves walking out into the oncoming torrent of scooters and allowing them to weave around as you inch across the road. You definitely need your wits about you, but our introduction to road crossing on this trip was Connaught Place in Delhi which was much worse. Hanoi’s scooters seem to have a general flow and obey the same logic, where as Indian roads involve many vehicles travelling at many different speeds in a chaotic weaving jumble that is much more unpredictable, scary and dangerous. 
Hanoi was overcast and a little chilly as we fought our way through the Old Quarter where we saw our first signs of Christmas; a few hotels had decorated trees donning their foyers. It is something that has been completely absent on our travels to date and these few sparse signs of Christmas feel inadequate as I can imagine the streets at home already full of lights and the Christmas music on the radio We reached our destination of the evening, St Jospeh’s Cathedral close to the Hoan Kiem Lake. Built in 1886 its looks like a mini version of Notre Dame in Paris, but you couldn’t mistake it for the Parisian version as it is painted a rather mundane white on the inside, but the real giveaway was the Vietnamese mass going on inside. Vietnam has 5.5 million Catholics thanks to the French missionaries who brought it here in the 19th century. With only 7% of the population Catholic, the French missionaries weren’t as successful in converting them from Buddhism as they were converting the Vietnamese language to a Roman alphabet. This was extremely useful in a country where English is not widely spoken as it it gives you a chance at pronouncing the words unlike in most other Asian countries, which use their own alphabet, only recognisable to us as bizarre scribbles.  
It was back to the hotel early as we had another early start for our overnight excursion to Ha-Long Bay the following day. After a 4 hour bus ride on Monday (26th Nov) morning we made it to the Ha-Long Bay from Hanoi and we were soon on our junk boat. No, it wasn’t as bad as it sounds! The junk boats ferry the tourists around the sights of the bay and it was actually pretty nice and roomy for a boat and the food and service of the staff on board was excellent. The weather wasn’t as accommodating though, it was cold, windy and raining. We spent a wet weekend in Donegal back in July and the weather wasn’t dissimilar. 
Ha-Long Bay is a series of 3000 islands close to the Chinese border which protrude directly out of the sea in great limestone cliffs. The karst scenery is similar to what we have been seeing throughout SE Asia, but nowhere is as dramatic or as beautiful as Ha-Long Bay. The legend to their formation goes that a family of dragons protecting Vietnam spat out jewels into the sea, which turned into rocks and smashed the ships of the invaders. Science tells us that they were formed over millions of years through complicated movements of the sea floor, volcanic activity and weathering. After a tour of a seriously overcrowded cave on one of the island my wife and I decided to reestablish our rather fractious sea kayaking partnership.  We paddled and bickered our way around a floating village in the Bay, some of whose inhabitants apparently have never been on land, and many actually get sick from being on stable ground. We spent the night drinking the boats overpriced canned beer with the other guests, most of who also seemed to have conflicting ideas about the direction, speed and paddling pattern with their partners on their kayaks. Sea kayaking might be great fun, but I definitely wouldn’t recommend it as a great activity for team building.
Tuesday (29th Nov) morning had better weather and we climbed to the top of one of the islands for a better view. It was a short, but steep climb to the top and the bird’s eye view of the bay was well worth it. We could see hundreds of the islands sticking up out of the sea and they seemed to go on forever. Soon enough we were back on the boat for lunch and sailing back to the shore. 


I was impressed with the efficiency of the cruise. We boarded the boat at 12:30pm and disembarked at 12:00, we had two meals on both days and all the time the service was superb. But as soon as we got off there was another boat load of tourists coming on board for the staff to repeat the whole procedure, most likely 7 days a week. For me, it typified the hard working “get on with it” attitude of the Vietnamese. They seem to work all hours and always be in a hurry to do it, without complaining. This attitude has no doubt played a huge role in Vietnam’s recent rapid development, hopefully an improvement in the infrastructure is their next target.
It was soon back to Hanoi and despite being our third visit to the city we had little time to explore it further, but we did get a chance for a street stall barbeque, which was delicious. Overall Vietnamese food has been better than most in the region narrowly shading Thai food but lagging Malaysian, however we can get into that later when we present the awards for our trip.
Our flight home involves a rather irritating 14 hour layover in Bangkok, but at least it presents me with this opportunity to write the penultimate post. The last post will be a joint effort with my wife making her debut on the blog. That of course isn’t strictly true as her efforts in proofing my posts have been magnificent. She has turned my error strewn posts into something readable for my faithful readers who I would also like to thank for spending the time to follow us on travels.
So Goodbye from the road at least, I hope to get the final post up in the next few days.

Sunday 25 November 2012

Hoi-An

Days 92-94

We are now flying our way back North to Hanoi for the final few days of our trip. Our stay in Hoi-An was brief, which is unfortunate as its relaxed vibe makes it the type of place that deserves a longer visit to allow you to slip into its mode. But that’s in an ideal world, a world that would have us bounding with enthusiasm for the trip right up until the last day, but the great whirlpool that has been this trip is now draining us back on home and we are relenting to its pull.
We arrived in Hoi-An on Friday (23 Nov) in another one of those dreaded buses form Hue. Although four and a half hours was a manageable amount especially considering we know it will be the last significant bus journey we take on this trip. We got dropped off right outside of a hotel, which was a bargain. The hotel was clean, had satellite TV, a swimming pool, air-con and hot water for only $10 a night, quite possibly the best value of our trip.
Hoi-An is an old port city that was founded by the Nyguens in 1595. In its hayday it was one of the foremost ports and with trade flourishing it became a very cosmopolitan city. However the river estuary on which it stands silted up making entry to the port difficult and the traders moved to Da Nang just to the north along the coast. The result to Hoi An was that it stagnated and was left as it was with all the 19th century buildings and temples preserved.
It’s a lovely quaint and quiet place these days and most of the old buildings appear to cater for tourists. Restaurants, hotels and tailor shops line its streets, the latter of which are famous for fitting out visitors with cheap suits. We declined this along with most of the other vendors offers, which were the only fault in beautiful old Hoi-An and with three months on the tourist trail we are pretty much deaf to their cat-calls by now so it mattered little. The combination of the preserved buildings and forgotten status give the town a lovely relaxed atmosphere and we could have spent a few more days wandering its streets, recharging our batteries, but Hanoi and Ha-Long Bay were beckoning.
Our taxi right to the airport this morning (Sunday 25th Nov) was an indication of the current boom that Vietnam is going through. The coastal road between Hoi An and Da Nang is not dissimilar to PCH (Pacific Coast Highway) in California and is lined with resorts, holiday homes and golf courses. Da Nang itself is also a gleaming city, with modern buildings, new bridges and the airport that we flew out of is modern and efficient. All this modernization appears to be driven by the private sector and is in sharp contrast to the shoddily government maintained Highway 1. Perhaps a real indication of what is driving the economy of this officially communist country.
Strange as it may seem to those of you who are immersed in a daily routine, but we are at the point now where we are yearning for one. Although we are still trying to appreciate how lucky we are to be experiencing these countires, we are pretty much fed up shifting from hotel, to bus/train, getting ripped off and risking a swift bowel movement every time we have food and drink. Yes, we know it is freezing and raining in Ireland at the moment, but all we want is some familiar food and manners. Mashed potatoes, sausages, decent meat and a pint of stout are a few things that spring to mind. My standard breakfast of porridge is also near impossible to get in SE Asia, their version is a rice porridge with a few pieces of meat thrown in – Not my idea of breakfast at all. So great as this trip is, it will also be great to get back on some familiar turf.
With all that said we still have the city of Hanoi and Ha Long Bay to see before we set off for home on Wednesday. So for our last few nights we have booked into a slightly nicer place to at least try and give us a comfortable base to generate enthusiasm for both of these places that I have had a great desire to see when immersed in a routine that I now crave.